


dj please keep it coming (we're talking with our bodies)

by folignos



Category: Hockey RPF
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-04
Updated: 2016-07-04
Packaged: 2018-07-18 16:21:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,453
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7322278
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/folignos/pseuds/folignos
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>‘It’s the weekend!’ Boone yells in Brandon’s ear when they arrive.</p><p>‘It’s Tuesday,’ Brandon says, but he’s already weaving towards the bar, where all the bartenders seem to be allergic to shirts, women, and cheat days.</p><p>-</p><p>‘I found you a husband,’ Joey says, pushing the beer across the bartop.</p><p>Cam takes a long, slow drink before he even thinks about responding.</p><p>‘No,’ he says.</p>
            </blockquote>





	dj please keep it coming (we're talking with our bodies)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [alotofthingsdifferent](https://archiveofourown.org/users/alotofthingsdifferent/gifts).



> i wrote a treatfic for amanda! i was flipping through dear author letters, and "dj cam atkinson" caught my eye. i'm definitely going to play in this sandbox some more
> 
> also, just for clarification sake, i know cbj has a matty. it is not the matty in this fic. the matty in this fic is an omc. it's kind of a long story, but i try to shoehorn him in at every possible moment. just roll with it.

Brandon likes music. Always has, grew up playing the piano and the guitar, classical stuff because that was what his mom liked, and then, when he was older, he discovered bands like The Kinks, the Who, the Beatles.

He goes to college for music, but when he graduates, he gets a job in a local bakery because he needs the money and it’s that or move back home. He loves his parents, but he’d fallen in love with Columbus over the last four years, and he can’t imagine moving back to the suburbs of western Pennsylvania.

It’s not so bad, baking. He gets put to work making bread at first, and he likes that a lot, likes the kneading and the shaping, watching the bread rise in the oven. He starts singing while he works, and his boss, Mr Foligno (‘Call me _Nicky_ , Brandon,’ he’d said on Brandon’s first day, but his mom raised him right.) had simply stopped turning the radio on at the start of the day.

‘You’re much more fun to listen to than the radio,’ he’d said. The Russian confectioner, Sergei, laughs and says something encouraging in Russian. Brandon gives him a hopeful smile back, and goes back to his sourdough and _Hey Jude_.

-

Brandon’s a quiet guy, mostly. He doesn’t go out a lot, spends most of his evenings writing. Sometimes he’ll go out for a couple of drinks with his roommate, Seth, but the last time he set foot in a club was his twenty first birthday, and if he hadn’t been several beers and more shots than he can count deep at the time, it would have been very much against his will.

Clubs are loud, and crowded, and full of neon and flashing lights. Brandon’s never been able to tell if it’s that or the alcohol that makes his stomach spin, but it’s Boone’s birthday, and he insisted on getting fully and completely wasted.

‘It’s the weekend!’ he yells in Brandon’s ear when they arrive.

‘It’s Tuesday,’ Brandon says, but Boone’s already weaving towards the bar, where all the bartenders seem to be allergic to shirts, women, and cheat days.

In retrospect, Brandon should probably have figured out that Chemical Reaction was a gay bar long before he did.

-

It’s--awful. Brandon hates it. The music is too loud and it’s all jagged, he can’t even tell what song is playing because it’s been autotuned and remixed to hell.

The beer is cheap, though, so he guesses that’s okay, and he gets a wink and a smile from the tallest, cutest bartender, a guy with a bar through his nipple and curls falling into his eyes.

‘How did we even find this place?’ he asks Seth back at the booth. Seth is the only semi-responsible adult that Brandon knows, and when he’d heard about Boone’s plans, he’d insisted on dragging Seth along too.

‘Matty,’ Ryan says, drawing in the condensation of his glass.

Everything suddenly makes a lot of sense.

Matty is new to the bakery, but he’s quickly insinuated himself as Brandon’s new best friend and duet partner. He mostly likes show tunes and Beyonce, but Brandon’s okay with that, for the most part. He hadn’t even made it through the door of the club, getting pulled aside by the bouncer who insisted on seeing his ID. Matty had fluttered his eyelashes and started flirting up a storm, so they’d abandoned him, but Brandon remembers Matty telling him about his boyfriend who bounces part time at a club in town. This club, he guesses.

Brandon figures he probably won’t see Matty for the rest of the night. 

Seth slides another beer over the table to him, and Brandon takes it, grateful. The music has changed to something screechy and horrible. He wonders vaguely if the DJ has died and is lying over his turntables. That might account for how bad the music is. Brandon chugs half his beer at once, and immediately feels better.

-

Cam loves music. He’d grown up playing the drums, mostly, but had never been able to play anything else, much as he wanted to. What he loved most, though, was taking music and making it into something new. He got his first set of turntables when he was seventeen.

By the time he was twenty one, he was playing at a different club every night of the week as DJ Camsanity. Tuesday night is Chemical Reaction.

He’d gotten the job because his best friend works there, had gotten him an audition somehow, and Cam had just-- done what he always did. Sunk into the music, closed his eyes, let the beat carry him and the people listening. He was hired on the spot, and it almost immediately became one of his favourite gigs. He actually shares the slot with another guy, Wild Bill, and they alternate who gets the early and who gets the late shift.

Cam’s just wrapping up when Bill comes into the booth. He’s wearing a cowboy hat and a ridiculous painted on shirt, and when he takes the hat off to plug headphones in, his long hair is tied in a knot at the back of his neck.

‘You’re a cliche,’ Cam says, taking his headphones off.

Bill winks at him.

‘We can’t all look like someone’s mormor,’ he says, tugging on Cam’s curl. Cam whacks at his hand, scowling. He knows the curls are out of control at the minute, he can’t help it.

‘I got you a beer,’ Bill says. ‘It’s with Joey. I figured you’d need one.’

Cam takes back every bad thing he has ever said or thought about Bill. He pulls him into a one armed bro-hug, shoves his snapback over the curls, and heads down to the bar.

-

‘I found you a husband,’ Joey says, pushing the beer across the bartop.

Cam takes a long, slow drink before he even thinks about responding.

‘No,’ he says. Joey’s eyes get all wide and upset.

‘But he’s perfect,’ he says. 

_No_.’

‘Fine,’ Joey says. ‘I’ll take him for myself.’

‘Cool,’ Cam says, and shifts on his seat to look out at the dance floor. He doesn’t tend to hook up at most places he works, in the interest of maintaining as much of a sense of professionalism as he can get, being friends with Joey. Chemical Reaction though, has a lot of guys who are eager to remain anonymous, and who don’t want anything more than a beej in one of the stalls. Cam can jive with that.

It doesn’t mean he wants to hook up with someone Joey deems perfect, though. He loves Joey, but his taste in men is questionable at the absolute best.

He spots Scott’s boyfriend out on the dance floor with, shockingly, a small horde of men all trying to get a piece of him. Matty’s a good dancer, and he kind of attracts people without them really knowing. It drives Scott insane, Cam knows. He watches Matty grab one of them by the hips and pull him in, slotting their lower bodies together and rolling into the music. Bill always starts off with something deep and dirty, to get people in the mood. He hasn’t been DJing as long as Cam, but he knows his stuff, knows how to play the crowd to a T.

‘Back again?’ he hears Joey shouting over the music. ‘I must have made a good impression on you.’

Cam glances over, and shifts again to give the guy a little more room to get to the bar. He’s tall, dark and handsome, and exactly Cam’s type. Joey looks over at Cam long enough to give him a smirk, and then offers the guy the dirtiest smile in his arsenal. Cam calls it his Fuck Me Already smile.

The guy, for what it’s worth, just gives him a polite, slightly confused smile back, and hands over money for another couple of beers. He wraps his hands around the glass bottles easily, and Cam can’t help but notice his fingers. Long, strong looking fingers. Musician’s hands, his mom would say.

Cam doesn’t watch him leave, because he’s an adult who can control himself. He turns fully to Joey, who is unashamedly watching the guy’s ass disappear into the crowd.

‘That’s my husband?’ he asks.

‘Not any more,’ Joey says. ‘You didn’t want him. No take backsies.’

‘What are you, five?’ Cam asks. ‘Who even says take backsies any more?’

‘He’s mine now,’ Joey whines. ‘You didn’t want him!’

Joey is Cam’s very best friend in the world. Cam wants him to have all kinds of nice things. Those hands are _definitely_ a nice thing.

Cam thinks about it while he’s finishing his beer. And then he gives Joey an innocent smile, slides the empty bottle back across the bar, hops down from his barstool, and heads into the crowd.

-

Brandon gets back to his booth to find everyone, even Seth, gone. When he scans the dancefloor, he sees Seth with a cute, youngish guy, dancing close. Huh. He puts both the beers down on the table and sits, not sure what to do now. He had kind of hoped he and Seth could be single guys together.

‘Been left hanging?’ someone from behind him asks.

‘Kind of,’ Brandon says. ‘Looks like my roommate got a better offer.’ He nods at the dancefloor, and turns to see the short, blond guy that was sitting at the bar just now. ‘Guess I have a spare beer.’

‘I can fix that,’ the guy says, bold, and reaches out for it. Brandon laughs, surprised.

‘Brandon,’ he says, knocking the bottles together.

‘Cam,’ the guy says, and gives him a bright smile.

-

‘They must have changed the DJ,’ Brandon says, gesturing at the DJ booth with his bottle.

‘Yeah?’ Cam asks, smiling to himself. ‘How so?’

‘Well, the music doesn’t suck any more,’ Brandon says, and Cam bursts out laughing.

Brandon frowns. It’s kind of adorable. ‘What’d I say?’

‘Nothing, nothing,’ Cam says. ‘They did change the DJ, as a matter of fact. Wanna know how I know?’

Brandon’s frown deepens. Cam leans in. ‘I was the first DJ,’ he whispers, and watches Brandon’s eyes go wide.

‘Oh my god,’ he says. ‘I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean--’

‘It’s fine,’ Cam says, still laughing. ‘I’m kind of an acquired taste. You’re not much of a clubber, huh?’

Brandon shakes his head. ‘Never really got used to it, even in college.’

‘You must have been the anomaly,’ Cam says. ‘Where’d you study?’

‘OSU,’ he says. ‘Liked the city so much I stuck around.’

Cam feigns horror, makes as if to get up. ‘I would never have sat down if I’d known you went to _OSU_ ,’ he says, aghast.

Brandon looks alarmed, and then half smiles. ‘You went to OU, right? You’re wearing the hat.’

Cam grins and nods. ‘So you understand we can’t be friends?’

‘That’s a shame,’ Brandon muses. ‘I was starting to like you.’

‘Life is tough that way,’ Cam agrees.

He’s the first one to break, snorting out a laugh that makes Brandon smile, relieved. He has a really wonky smile, Cam’s noticed. It is incredibly endearing.

‘Want to get out of here?’ Cam asks. ‘There’s a twenty four hour coffee place around the corner, and I’m dying for some caffeine.’

‘Is it quieter than here?’

‘As the grave,’ Cam says, grinning.

‘Sounds perfect,’ Brandon says.

-

Brandon’s pretty sure coffee goes well.

Well enough that he’s standing outside Cam’s apartment making out with him, anyway. Cam’s short, but he feels bigger under Brandon’s hands, surprisingly solid.

He palms Cam’s hip and finds a sharp crease of muscle there.

‘At least you bought me a drink first,’ Cam says, removing his tongue from Brandon’s mouth for about half a second. ‘Wanna come in? My neighbours don’t hate me like they hate Joey yet.’

Brandon follows him into the apartment, grabbing at his ass shamelessly, making him squirm and giggle.

There’s a drum kit in the corner of the room.

‘Is that why your neighbours hate your roommate?’ he asks, as Cam strips off his jacket and hat, dumping them in the closet.

‘Hmm? No, those are mine. I play them in the middle of the day, everyone around here has a real job.’

‘I never learnt the drums,’ Brandon says, running his hand over one. ‘My mom said I had to pick quieter instruments.’

‘You’re a musician?’ Cam asks, taking Brandon’s coat.

Brandon hums. ‘Guitar, piano, violin. I went to college for music.’

‘You should tell me all about it,’ Cam says, sounding genuine. ‘When I’m making you breakfast tomorrow.’

Brandon’s shocked into silence, and when he looks over at Cam, he’s smirking, kind of dirty, and Brandon feels himself flush.

‘Sorry,’ he says. ‘I get distracted by music talk. One of my many flaws.’

Cam hums. He’s sitting on the couch, legs spread just a little bit, hand lying gently on his upper thigh. Brandon gets the message, and heads for the couch.

-

‘I always thought I’d go to college for engineering,’ Brandon says, through a mouthful of eggs. ‘That’s what my dad does, and I always wanted to do the same, but as I got older, I got better at music, and I actually got scouted. I didn’t even know that happened to musicians, but. OSU wanted to offer me a scholarship for music, so. I took it. And now I work in a bakery forty hours a week.’ He laughs. ‘I love my job. It’s just not exactly what I envisioned for the future, you know?’

‘I was gonna play hockey,’ Cam says, over by the stove, flipping bacon. ‘I know, funny, right? I’m all of five seven. But that’s what I wanted to do, so. That’s what I did, until I got cut. And kept getting cut, over and over, and eventually, I gave up. Music loved me way more than hockey ever did.’

Breakfast lasts longer than Brandon thought breakfast could. He’d gotten a text from Mr Foligno telling him they were closed for the day, company wide “bug” apparently, and he hopes Brandon’s not feeling too under the weather. Cam had thrown his head back and laughed when Brandon had read the text.

‘The way your friends were putting them away, I’m not surprised.’

‘Me neither. Looks like my day is unexpectedly free, though. I wonder what I could do with it.’

‘I have some ideas,’ Cam says, grinning that wicked grin from last night, and he turns off the burners with a flourish.

Brandon pushes his chair back to make room for Cam on his lap, and can’t help but laugh when he tilts his face up to meet him.


End file.
